Mostly about my backyard chickens. (Boring, I know), but there are a lot of us out here. Mine are only kept as pampered pets. I could eat a neighbor's chicken, but not MINE. There may be a comment on current events only if I get riled up enough. And there will always be a cartoon or a joke to cheer us. I promise to try my very best to respond to comments. Now I have to figure out how this blogger thingy works....

Thursday, June 12, 2014

A bit of American history....

A bit of American history:

Tar and Feathers in Revolutionary America

Benjamin H. Irvin
Brandeis University

In the spring of 1766, John Gilchrist, a Norfolk merchant and
ship-owner, came to believe that Captain William Smith had reported his
smuggling activities to British authorities. In retribution, Gilchrist
and several accomplices captured Smith and, as he reported, "dawbed my
body and face all over with tar and afterwards threw feathers on me."
Smith's assailants, which included the mayor of Norfolk, then carted him
"through every street in town," and threw him into the sea. Fortunately,
Smith was rescued by a passing boat just as he was "sinking, being able to
swim no longer."
Tar and feathers was a very old form of punishment, but it does not
appear to have ever been widely applied in England or in Europe. Why Gilchrist and his allies chose to resurrect tar and
feathers on this particular occasion historians can only surmise.
Whatever their reasons, these Virginians inaugurated a new trend in
colonial resistance, a trend that their New England neighbors would
eagerly follow. Throughout New England, tar and feathers soon became the
"popular Punishment for modern delinquents." By March, 1770, at least
thirteen individuals had been feathered in the American colonies: eight
in Massachusetts, two in New York, one in Virginia, one in Pennsylvania,
and one in Connecticut.In all of these instances, the tar brush
was reserved exclusively for customs inspectors and informers, those
persons responsible for enforcing the Townshend duties on certain imported
goods. Indeed, American patriots used tar and feathers to wage a war of
intimidation against British tax collectors.
During this period of economic resistance, the practice of tarring and
feathering began to take shape as a kind of folk ritual. The participants
in this ritual usually consisted of sailors, apprentices, and young
boys---those members of society who could be readily mobilized by
protesting merchants. In these early days the victim was sometimes
fortunate enough to be "genteely" tarred and feathered, that is, over the
outer garments. Within Whig ideology, these personal assaults were
warranted only because the colonists had been denied all legal avenues of
redress, and they were justified only to the extent necessary to deter
enforcement of customs duties.
This first tar and feathers campaign proved very successful. In
conjunction with the nonimportation movement, tar and feather terrorism
reduced Townshend duties' revenues below the costs of enforcement. In
1770, the British government recognized that the program was an abysmal
failure, and it repealed the taxes on all imports but tea. As a result,
the tarring and feathering of these loathed individuals came to a virtual
halt. This is not to suggest, however, that the practice of tarring and
feathering ceased entirely. To the contrary, tar and feathers had proven
an effective deterrent, and patriot leaders quickly devised a new use for
it. Before the repeal of the Townshend duties, when the colonists began
to galvanize in their opposition to British taxes, Whig merchants
coordinated a series of nonimportation agreements. To enforce these
agreements, they then invoked the threat of tar and feathers. During this
second phase of tarring and feathering, the practice changed
significantly. Most notably, Boston mobs began to tar and feather an
individual's property and effects rather than his body. Several persons'
homes were tarred and feathered, as was at least one merchant's store. In
Marlborough, a crowd went so far as to tar and feather the horse of
merchant Henry Barnes.
As the possibility of war grew imminent, however, Boston leaders began
to feel that they could no longer control the violent impulses of the mob.
In the wake of the incendiary Tea Party, tarring and feathering mobs
nearly killed a crotchety old British official named John Malcom, and they
also assaulted four men who had stolen hospital blankets. Meanwhile, back
in England, King George III watched indignantly as impertinent
colonists abused his agents and officials. In Parliament, where debates
raged over how best to punish the Bostonians, one member argued that
"Americans were a strange sett of people, and that it was in vain to
expect any degree of reasoning from them; that instead of making their
claim by argument, they always chose to decide the matter by tarring and
feathering." Recognizing that unrestrained violence
could only bring the American cause into ill repute, Boston leaders called
a halt to the practice of tarring and feathering. The town that
contemporaries called a "seminar[y] in the art," and the "Focus of tarring
& feathering," now laid the practice to rest.
In this resolve, however, Bostonians were alone. After 1773, mobs
throughout the colonies continued to treat offenders to the "new-fashioned
discipline." And, within this period, the meaning of tar and feathers
continued to evolve. The punishment that had once been reserved for trade
war culprits was increasingly applied to Tories and their sympathizers.
In Georgia, New Jersey, and Connecticut, villagers were quick to feather
any perceived "enemy to the rights of America." Tar and feathers were
also put to use by the various local committees that formed throughout the
colonies. In Charleston, the Secret Committee ordered the first South
Carolina tarring and featherings for two men charged with disrespect
towards the General Committee. Women also took part in this patriotic
ritual. In the fall of 1777, for instance, the participants in a quilting
bee seized a youth who dared to speak against the Continental Congress.
For want of tar and feathers, these women applied molasses and "the downy
tops of the flags that grew in the meadow."
As the focus of tar and feathers shifted from informers to loyalists,
the practice became more violent. In 1775, a physician named Abner Beebe
was blistered by the hot tar poured upon him. The mob then "carried [him]
to an Hog Sty & rubbed [him] over with Hogs [sic] Dung. They threw the
Hog's Dung in his Face, & rammed some of it down his Throat." In 1776, a Charleston mob committed a even grizzlier
execution. According to the local paper:

John Roberts, a dissenting minister, was seized on
suspicion of being an enemy to the rights of America, when he was tarred
and feathered; after which, the populace, whose fury could not be
appeased, erected a gibbet on which they hanged him, and afterwards made a
bonfire, in which Roberts, together with the gibbet, was consumed to
ashes.

Over time, the increasing violence of the colonial crowds gave rise to
a great deal of ambivalence towards tarring and feathering among patriot
organizers. Colonial leaders recognized the injustice of persecuting
individuals who had committed no crime against the colonies. For this
reason, many leaders began urging the American people to put aside the
practice of tarring and feathering. Even Thomas Paine argued that tarring
and feathering ought to be abandoned. Yet others
resisted Paine's proposal. As late as 1779, a Providence correspondent
asked the American people to "[d]etermine whether the application of tar
and feathers be not more absolutely necessary at this day, than at any
time heretofore!"
Notwithstanding this debate, tarring and feathering continued
throughout the war and even after it ended. "In the Jersies," wrote Peter
Oliver, "they naturalize [returning loyalists] by tarring and feathering;
and it costs them more in scrubbing and cleaning than an admission is
worth, so that you know the fate of trading your natale solum.") Though the Revolution ended with the Treaty of Paris,
Americans still felt the need to confirm themselves in their own
patriotism and to subject those who had opposed them to a painful rite of
reintegration.
(Tarring and feathering
used pine tar, not modern day tar. Pine tar starts to melt at 130-140
degree F, and this temperature would cause mild first degree burns.
Most people who were tarred and feathered survived, but the process of
tarring and feathering often caused extreme pain. First of all, the
victim had first degree burns all over their skin exposed to the tar.
Second, the process of removing tar was painful; the victim would
basically scrap the tar off the skin, taking a large portion of the skin
with the tar. This left the victim extremely wounded and bloody. Some
have died due to the infections in these wounds (as in the old times,
there were no modern day disinfectants or anti-bacterial medicines). If
the victim was unable to get the tar off and the tar hardened, the tar
could potentially restrict the victim's breathing and cause him to
asphyxiate. Also, as most victims of tarring and feathering were
abandoned in remote areas, they would die of obvious causes of hunger
and thirst. Regardless, tarring and feathering caused a large degree of
humiliation to the victim, often resulting in them moving to other
areas entirely.)

About Me

Mostly about my backyard chickens (Boring, I know), but there are a lot of us out here. Mine are only kept as pampered pets. I could eat a neighbor's chicken, but not MINE. There may be a comment on current events only if I get riled up enough. And there will always be a cartoon or a joke to cheer us. I promise to try my very best to respond to comments. Now I have to figure out how this blogger thingy works....